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How To Make An Easy Paper Aeroplane

Paper aeroplanes are easy to make and so fun to play with, and they're great for teaching children about gravity, and aerodynamics. Plus you only need one piece of paper to make them.

While you're sharpening your skills, it's easiest to use plain A4 paper; but after that, feel free to experiment with any scrap paper or card, cut into a rectangle.

You will need

1 piece of A4 paper (white or coloured) per plane

Instructions

1. Lay your A4 piece of paper flat on a table, with one of the shorter sides toward you.

2. Fold the paper in half vertically, so the crease is along the middle of the longer side, making sure the corners of the paper match up. Use your fingers or thumb to make sure the crease is sharp. Then unfold the paper, but do not turn it over.

3 Fold the two corners at the top towards the middle crease. You have to make sure that the edges of the paper are aligned as near as possible to the middle crease, so that the two outer edges of the paper touch each other at the crease line. The above step will have formed triangular flaps on each side of the paper. The top of it should be pointed, while the bottom edge of the flap should be a straight line.

5 Then fold the flap towards the middle of the paper. Fold the top corner of the outside edge and fold it towards the middle – so that the edges meet up along the vertical crease in the middle. Your piece of folded paper will now be in the shape of a triangle, with a point at the top.

6. Fold the paper in half by making a fold along the vertical crease – run your finger or thumb along the crease to make it sharp.

7. Now you can fold the wings down. Fold the paper down from the top to make a wing, leaving a few cm at the bottom. Repeat the same for the other side, but make sure that your second wing is in the exact same place as the first.

8. Try out a test flight! You could even have competitions seeing who can reach the furthest.

Future flights

When you're confident with the basic fold, there are lots of variations to play with. For starters, check out Fold N' Fly and paperaeroplanes.com, or watch the tutorial videos on youtube

Are you an experienced paper aeroplane folder? What's the furthest your family have managed? We'd love to hear!